Interview with Tom Connell, AM Agenda

9 October 2024

TOM CONNELL: Welcome back. A lot of talk around a gaffe, I suppose you'd call it from Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, yesterday joining me in the studio, someone who's never made a mistake in her life. Shadow Finance Minister Jane Hume, is that true?

JANE HUME: Have I never made a mistake in my life?

TOM CONNELL: Have you ever had a verbal slip?

JANE HUME: Of course, I have had a verbal slip and I would hope that my verbal slips aren’t an insight into the darker sides of my character, yesterday's insult, and let's face it, that's what it was, was by a panicked Prime Minister and, you know, I think it spoke volumes of the type of man that he is. You know, people with Tourette's Syndrome deserve our respect. They don't deserve our derision. This was a highly disrespectful comment that was made by the Prime Minister, and yes, he apologised. Of course he was going to apologise. What choice did he have? He did not just apologise once. He apologised twice. He skulked back into the chamber after all the media had gone to bed and apologised again.

TOM CONNELL: A more genuine one and going further.

JANE HUME: Was it, was it really? I mean, I think perhaps, you know, it would have been more genuine to not make the comment in the first place.

TOM CONNELL: I mean, there were countless Scott Morrison gaffes. I even remember when Tony Abbott said there was a Holocaust of jobs, just sort of slipped out. Nobody thought this was someone that was anti-Semitic.

JANE HUME: It was appalling and I think he apologised for that too, but this is a Prime Minister clearly under pressure and when you're under pressure, sometimes your true character is revealed.

TOM CONNELL: So the failure to get an agreement was the focus yesterday, in terms of October 7 and commemorating that, was there not some way to include a call for a ceasefire? And there is some complication around that because Israel says Hamas and Hezbollah can't just rebuild, you know, build up their munitions or whatever, or capability. But ultimately, that's what everyone wants to happen in the end, isn't it? There's not so much peace in the Middle East, but more peace than there is right now.

JANE HUME: But for a motion that was specifically about October 7, I think that there was a perfect opportunity to demonstrate our support for Jewish Australians and also for our ally Israel. This is not a time, it was not a time to put conditions and equivocations into a motion.

TOM CONNELL: Could the Coalition say, could split them up? We'll do this one. If you do the other one, you know, we won't blow up too much?

JANE HUME: Well, Peter Dutton went to the Prime Minister in advance of that motion and said he wanted to see a bipartisan motion put forward. He wanted to see the entire Parliament come together. It was the Prime Minister's choice not to take that option, and he did so for political purposes. I think that's pretty despicable.

TOM CONNELL: Small businesses struggling, so 11,000 insolvencies in the past 12 months, and 46% not making a profit, is probably something that leaps off the page more to me, not, not, you know, to downplay the ones going bust. The Small Business Lobby says we need policies. Is the Coalition going to take some? Are you talking to them? Meeting with them today? Because COSBOA is in the building, as they say.

JANE HUME: There are a number of groups in the building today that are specifically talking about business conditions in Australia, which have progressively worsened over the last two years. In fact, there's now, I think, the highest number of insolvencies per quarter under this government, than any government previously, around two and a half thousand or so insolvencies per quarter. 22,800 just in this term of government. The irony that this government could say that they are the party of small business. I mean, that's just deluded. Between high energy prices, industrial relations laws that are tying them up in knots, red tape, green tape.

TOM CONNELL (INTERRUPTS): So, IR will be a difference. What about energy prices? And I mean short term, I want to hear nuclear, because it’s not going to change anything by July 1 next year. On July 1, will there have to be an extension of the rebate on energy prices? Otherwise, more businesses will go to the wall. Is that something you're looking at?

JANE HUME: The only thing we can do and the only thing that businesses are asking us to do is ensure that there is more reliable energy in the system, and that has to come from gas, it has to come from gas.

TOM CONNELL: But you can't, but you can't do that. If there's an election in May, you can't sort that out by July. It's just not possible.

JANE HUME: Well, I'm afraid that there has been problems with putting more gas into the system because of the decisions that this government has made, and that's why we're two years behind.

TOM CONNELL: There’s a lot there as well. But the point again is when, if you come to power in May, saying, let's get more gas, it will not help anyone by July.

JANE HUME: Energy subsidies are simply putting a band aid on a bullet hole, they are not going to help.

TOM CONNELL (INTERRUPTS): So you’re ruling out extending them, is what you're saying?

JANE HUME: I haven’t even considered that issue. What I can say, though, is that Bill Shorten himself, said in front of me, in front of the cameras, that those subsidies for businesses for energy did not even touch the sides and businesses are telling us the same thing.

TOM CONNELL (INTERRUPTS): They’re saying don’t want them?

JANE HUME: They want energy prices to come down.

TOM CONNELL: They don't want the energy price, but in the short term, they're saying we don't want the subsidy extended.

JANE HUME: They want energy prices to come down sustainably, so that their businesses can run sustainably. They can't simply run on government subsidies forever. The most important thing is to have more supply into the system, more supply into the system.

TOM CONNELL: Is that the default Coalition position?

JANE HUME: It’s never been a Coalition policy to have subsidies for energy. What we want to see is more supply into the system that will sustainably bring prices down.

TOM CONNELL: So your policy at the moment, would, that you would not extend that?

JANE HUME: Ironically, Labor's policy, theoretically, is more gas too. They just don't, they just don't follow through on it. Their gas policy has been shelved already. We want to see more gas into the system, because that's the only way that you're going to reliably bring prices down over the medium term.

TOM CONNELL: In answer to my question, you're saying you will not, emphatically not extend that subsidy?

JANE HUME: Subsidies for energy have never been Coalition policy, and businesses have said they haven't worked. They haven't touched the sides. They need something more sustainable.

TOM CONNELL: Quickly on NBN, Labor says they're going to legislate to avoid it being sold off. What are you going to do there?

JANE HUME: This is extraordinary. I mean, this has come out of nowhere. It's a solution looking for a problem. I think the Coalition haven't said that they intended to privatise.

TOM CONNELL (INTERRUPTS): That was the plan for the NBN originally?

JANE HUME: It was, it was Labor's plan for the NBN. Labor's plan for the NBN was that it would return a dividend by the 2020s and then eventually it would be privatised. Now, they seem to have changed their minds. But this has come out of nowhere. They've brought it on for debate in the House this morning.

TOM CONNELL (INTERRUPTS): You feeling a wedge?

JANE HUME: Well, isn't it amazing that you would bring it on early, just before the Prime Minister jets off overseas.

TOM CONNELL: So what will you do?

JANE HUME: It's before, well, I haven't even seen the legislation yet.

TOM CONNELL (INTERRUPTS): Well, it’s pretty simple. Don't sell off the NBN.

JANE HUME: Well, no, it's not that simple, actually. There's a whole series of steps in the legislation already that would prevent a knee jerk sale of the NBN, a whole bunch of safeguards that were put there by Labor, put there by Stephen Conroy, and the Labor Party now wants to take those safeguards away. This is something that I simply do not understand. Now I'm being briefed on this today, but they've brought the legislation on for debate, before briefing the Ministers, the Shadow Ministers, that's unheard of. That is a political stunt.

TOM CONNELLL: We like detail on this program, so I suppose I'll let you off by saying, we'll wait till you've got the detail, and then we'll get your position, I'm sure.

JANE HUME: I'm sure you will.

TOM CONNELL: Jane Hume, thank you.